Tap into Erie: Going with a new flow

The Erie Regional Chamber and Growth Partnership launched Tap Into Erie, a marketing campaign starring Erie's abundant fresh water supply, in 2008 -- just as the economy was spiraling downward.

Businesses that the chamber had hoped to attract were setting up shop elsewhere.

"Basically we go from expansion and growth mode around the country to a contraction mode," said Jacob Rouch, the chamber's vice president of economic development. "Space and buildings throughout the country opened up at affordable rates. Erie, being a cost-effective place to do business in 2007, all of a sudden had competitors that weren't even on the landscape."

Now that the economy is back on the upswing, the chamber has renewed the marketing effort -- this time with a narrower focus.

The chamber is now working with a prospecting firm and focusing Tap Into Erie efforts on international companies in particular, Rouch said.

Most large-scale U.S. companies want to grow and expand in larger metropolitan areas closer to a larger pool of existing customers, he said.

For foreign companies, particularly startups, "where they locate in the U.S. is not as critical because they may not have an existing base of customers," Rouch said. "They're not predisposed to a particular location."

Access to large volumes of water might not be the one factor that convinces a business to locate in a particular area, but without it, companies will look elsewhere, Rouch said.

"It's the ante to be in the game," he said. "If you can't provide water, it doesn't matter how many incentives you have. If you can't meet the company's water need, you're out."

Water is a key ingredient in helping Develop Erie, formerly the Economic Development Corp. of Erie County, attract two multimillion-dollar projects.

A division of KLN Family Brands, a Minnesota-based snack food manufacturer, plans to open a processing plant at the former Troyer Farms potato chip plant on Route 97, south of Waterford. And a Canadian corporation is considering building a $360 million iron-smelting plant in the Albion-Cranesville area.

Develop Erie, the architect of the Erie Inland Port project, plans to build a $22.1 million water system that will pipe water from Lake Erie underground to an elevated water tank and a water treatment plant in Albion to help serve the plant.

The Albion-Cranesville site is one of about five being considered by the Canadian company, said John Elliott, Develop Erie's chief executive.

Water is "very, very important in a project like an iron plant," Elliott said. "If they didn't have the water, they would have walked away. The reason they were looking at us is energy and transportation, but they would have walked away if we couldn't give them the water."

ERICA ERWIN can be reached at 870-1846 or by e-mail. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/ETNerwin.